It's kinda strange, in Sweden there are many hockey experts etc lobbying for a 5 minute major for fighting only. As of now, it's at least a game misconduct, more often than not it's a match penalty with further suspensions.

Most junior teams usually have 1-2 good fighters, they keep the fans coming to the games even when the team sucks. I can't imagine not being able to see those guys, junior fights are often a lot better than ones in the NHL.

While I hate the references to things like socialist Canada (... you're from Quebec, aren't you?), it is indeed a move that could really be negative for quite a few major junior teams. If this happens, expect way more players drafted out of the Junior A Leagues -- if those leagues recognize that they'd be missing a very good opportunity if decide to bad fights.

But staged fights? I really couldn't care less.

I made the link to socialism because Canada is a country where the goverment controls everything, "Hockey Canada" being part of this.

It won't get banned that is just political lobbying by David Branch. Guy needs to worry less about what morons in Toronto think and worry about things that matter like what really is causing concussions

There was a time during the dead puck era when the OHL game was at least as entertaining as the NHL game. This was a time when you could jump on a guy's back and there wasn't a holding penalty. Not so now. Since 2005 when the OHL sanitized their game it has become unwatchable. Its a shame too, because this is where the players hone their skills for the NHL. The junior players are going to be hit like a shovel when they hit the NHL and a 6'4" defenseman goes up against them.

Branch is without a doubt the worst thing to happen to hockey since Alan Eagleson. Why he gets so much power is beyond me. This is a guy who has had a hidden agenda from day one to remove fighting. Well, it isn't hidden, the guy has said so in interviews. If you think these little rodents that run around the ice knowing that no one will touch them with the instigator penalty then imagine how the Maxim Lapierre's of the OHL will react when there is no fighting at all. Big mistake if they do it, and they won't because there is no way the owners will let it happen.

Bob Nicholson, what a sell out too. He says on behalf of "Canadian Hockey" we want to end fighting. Uh, Bob........do you think if the junior team you picked this year was a little more masculine that we would have been clobbered by the Russians in our own barn?

Get these clowns out of here. Their opinions alone ruin the game

Nicholson has pretty much showed his cards not too long ago when he said the futur for hockey in Canada was with the women playing hockey. That's the great thinker that runs Hockey Canada right now.

Staged fights rarely happen anymore, I'm not sure why this is even an issue. Most fighting is 'part of the game'. Agree or disagree, I'd rather have people fight after clean hits than have a Worrell/Oliwa bout disrupt the flow of the game.

If a guy doesn't want to fight, he rarely has to. Lots of guys go 4 years without a single fight.

One would expect the NCAA to be rampant with cheap shots then. It's not. And it's not like these players are coming from a culture that condemns fighting--they are mostly North American coming from the USHL or Canadian Jr. A.

I think banning it outright might be too much. Try making it a game misconduct first and see how it goes.

But I think we'll eventually see fighting being gradually phased out of hockey. Who knows. I like the fact that players have the ability to settle their differences on the ice but with more emphasis on safety and cleaner play... we'll see.

In the BCHL you can have five fights. Your 6th fight is a 1 game suspension, 7th is two games, 8 is four games and your 9th fight is a 8 game suspension or review by the league to end your season.

If you instigate your first instigator is a 1 game suspension, your 2nd instigator is a 2 game suspension, your third instigator is a 4 game suspension and your fourth instigator penalty is 8 games and review by the league to end your season.

They still have lots of fight out of heat of the moment stuff where people want to kill each other but the staged fighting is gone. If the NHL or CHL adopted this rule or a variation it would save the game.

Fighting has always been a part of hockey. People comparing it to other major sports are forgetting this.
You can't take take away part of the game and still call it ice hockey.
Next take out hitting and chirping? Just call it flat ball skating...